syncopated.

casually dressed & deep in conversation 2

what they talk about in the bedroom when the children are fast asleep

a poem to be read in a whisper

"I don't think she fails on purpose."
"Nowadays my knees can tell me when it's going to rain."
"Do you think they're asleep yet? I can hear them giggling."
"You know our neighbours threw away their plants? Even that tall Japanese bamboo."
"What was that?"
"Would you like to go to KL this December? We could buy you some scarves."
"Just now your sister made comments about our kitchen."
"It's nothing, someone threw a bottle down the rubbish chute."
"Did you have to beat him so hard?"
"Do you think if we had a house like that we'd be happy?"
"Ever since I married you there's been nothing but money problems."
"Your aunt has lost so much weight, I wonder how she did it."
"I worked at the floors since morning, can you smell the Dettol?"
"Admit it, you love your son more than your daughter."
"Who were you talking to on the phone just now?"
"Don't talk facing that side. I can't hear you."
"Don't touch me like that."
"Can you hear me like this?"
"I need sleep. I can't sleep. I need my sleep."
"Goodnight. Goodnight."
"Wake up, wake up, I think I hear something."
"That was me."
"That wasn't you. What are you saying?"
"No, that was me, yes."

-Alfian Sa'at, No Other City

. . .

And you read your Emily Dickinson
And I my Robert Frost
And we note our place with bookmarkers
That measure what we've lost
Like a poem poorly written
We are verses out of rhythm
Couplets out of rhyme
In syncopated time

And the dangling conversation
And the superficial sighs
Are the borders of our lives

-Simon & Garfunkel

Strummed at 8:42 PM (x)